-Statement of who and where
The Right to Education, Prison-University Partnerships, and Online Writing Pedagogy in the US is an article that focuses on whether or not prisoners should be able to have the opportunity to receive an education while they serve their sentence. It addresses the benefits, as well as some of the cons, that can develop from education rights; to the prisoners, as well as the community. The public and the educators are also addressed throughout this article.
The controversy of whether or not education should be available for prisoners is a big problem throughout the United States. Many people feel a deep concern about this issue; due to the fact that nowadays education is very expensive and a lot of people have a hard enough time being able to fund college for themselves; while trying not to take on a lot of loans. Also, family members of the prisoners feel deeply about this problem. Even though their son, daughter, mom, etc. have broken the law and depending on the severity of the crime they still want to be able to know their family member will be able to have a chance to live a normal life, after prison. Whether you are the prisoner, the taxpayer, a family member of the prisoner, a teacher, and so on this problem can be important, as well as a concern to anyone.
-Overcrowding in the prisons
One of the big reasons for the cutting of funds for prison education is because of the increase of inmates over the last few decades. There are 2.2 million people incarcerated in the U.S., higher than any other nation, and over the last 30 years it has risen 500%. This causes a great use of resources to provide food and shelter to these inmates, and this money has to come from another expense, which is from the educational funds which were minimal, and have decreased by more than 90%, especially once congress revoked Pell Grant access for prisoners. This shows that overpopulation is playing a big role, because the only other way that the prisons could afford to add an educational program is through outside money, such as donations, volunteers, or increasing the amount that taxpayers would have to pay, which is already a big void to most political leaders, because many Americans would agree that yes prison education is important, but not if they are getting a better education than those that are trying to get financial aid to Universities, because of the lack of grants to those students. This overcrowding is known to be because of the strict drug offenses, which are about 22% of all total prisoners. This increase in prisoners takes money away from the funding for educations, as the government more so just uses prisons to house and punish prisoners, instead of the European methods, which include making sure prisoners have the same educational opportunity as they would if they weren’t in prison. This is polar opposite from the system in the U.S.
-Result is less funding towards prison education
-The denial of prison education leads to the prisoner's mental health declining, which is one of their rights (Physical Health, Mental health)
-Benefits of education, (recividism, our obligations)
There are definitely many benefits to prisoners who decide to educate themselves in prison. Higher education in prison programs reduces recidivism, which is a
